Tim Peter Thinks

Can you believe the first quarter is behind us? Seriously, we’re already one-fourth of the way through the year and, while these Spring days are getting longer, they seem to go faster too. Seems like a good time to step back and see how you’re doing — and what you might have missed so far, don’t you think?

To help you catch up, here are the top 10 posts this past month as determined by your fellow Big Thinkers. Check ‘em out when you get a chance.

The clear winner this past month was “How to Use Emotion and Storytelling in Digital Marketing” from my Travel Tuesday series. But, don’t let the series throw you. Emotion and storytelling matter to customers across all verticals, not just travel. Your digital marketing can only improve if you incorporate appropriate emotions and effective storytelling into your campaigns. Don’t believe me? Well, the popularity of this post — it’s the 5th most popular post on the blog this year — suggests your fellow readers (and competitors) agree.

Another Travel Tuesday post snuck into the top 5, this one looking at the 4 rules of social marketing for hotel marketers. As is usually the case, most of the examples listed actually work across verticals, so are wroth reviewing regardless of your industry.

There you have it, Big Thinkers, the 10 top e-commerce and digital strategy posts from March. If you like this list and want to see more like it in the future, or posts that drill down on any of these topics in more detail, be sure to leave a comment below.

You may also enjoy these slides from a recent speaking engagement, “Elements of E-commerce: How Digital Storytelling Drives Revenue and Results”, here. The talk was my most popular presentation on Slideshare this past month (as well as very well received by its audience):

Finally, if you’re interested in learning even more about the future of e-commerce and marketing via the social, local, mobile web, register to receive a special report I’ve produced in conjunction with hotel marketing firm Vizergy, “Digital Hotel Marketing in a Multiscreen World.” While it’s targeted specifically at hotel and resort marketers, the lessons apply to just about any business. You can get your free copy of the report here.

You might also enjoy some of our past coverage of the social, local, mobile web and what it means for your business, including:

Keeping up with everything that’s going on in e-commerce and internet marketing every day is next to impossible. No matter how many blogs you try to read, how many emails your review, or how many conversations you have, it’s inevitable something will slip through the cracks.

To help you keep on top of all the changes in e-commerce and internet marketing, here are the top 10 posts your fellow Big Thinkers found most valuable over the last month:

Mobile continues to grow at ridiculous rates. No, really, really ridiculous. As this post, Holy Crap! Mobile’s Even Bigger Than You Thought, notes, major brands see greater growth from mobile today than they saw from desktop e-commerce a decade ago. And don’t let the “Travel Tuesday” fool you; the same changes are happening across most verticals.

Many companies have turned to guest blogging as a cornerstone of their link-building activities. But with Google’s recent statements about the value these tactics offer, it seemed like a good time to ask “Is Guest Blogging Dead?” The simple answer is “no,” but this complex topic is worth a longer look. Check out the whole post for more.

Keeping up with all the changes in digital marketing and e-commerce is rarely easy. But these 42 essential blogs and news sources I read religiously not only offers a helpful list of content, but a process for managing the volume, too. Worth checking out when you get a chance.

Finally, if you’re conducting any social marketing and find yourself asking “where are the sales?” you owe it to yourself to take a look at this post, “Why Doesn’t Social Shopping Work?”

I’d also recommend you take a look at my slides for “Digital Marketing Directions: Three Trends Shaping 2014 Internet Marketing” on Slideshare. Not only was it the most popular presentation there this month, but it fleshes out many of the topics in this month’s top posts:

OK, so maybe Yahoo’s not in such bad shape after all. How else do you explain the popularity of this post that asks “Should You Still Listen to Marissa Mayer?” Apparently, you all feel Ms. Mayer’s got a few tricks up her sleeve yet, too.

Mobile commerce will be huge. Well, not just huge, but HUGE. Emphasis, unfortunately, on “will be.” Despite some impressive growth—and significant projected going forward —today there’s still plenty of opportunity. Which led me to ask, “Why Isn’t Mobile Commerce Bigger?” And, you all seemed to find the answer interesting.

The Internet continues to shape organizations in myriad ways, including whether employees work in a centralized office, from home, while traveling, or some combination of all three. And, the popularity of this list of the “3 Key Things to Remember About Remote Work” suggests many companies continue to have questions about how to make remote work, um… work for their organizations.

I’d also recommend you take a look at my slides for “Digital Marketing Directions: Three Trends Shaping 2014 Internet Marketing” on Slideshare. Not only was it the most popular presentation there this month, but it fleshes out many of the topics in this month’s top posts:

We’re beginning to wrap up the year here around Thinks Central. But I don’t want to miss an important event: Our anniversary. That’s right, Big Thinkers. Your favorite little ol’ e-commerce and marketing blog (well, this blog, anyway) is 9 years old this month. Give or take[*].

Over the course of those 9 years, I’ve published more than 1,750 posts, received some 3,400 comments, received many hundreds of thousands of site visitors and pageviews, and gone through roughly 387 laptops (I may be wrong about that last number).

Anyway, to commemorate this occasion, I thought you might enjoy the 5 most popular posts from each of the last 5 years (2008-2012; I’ll have a full list of the most popular posts of 2013 next week). To determine “most popular” posts, I’ve selected those posts that had significant traffic, better-than-average bounce rate, and large number of social shares. Each post is listed by year and includes its overall rank, too. As a sign of the value of having “legacy” content or “tent-pole” content on your site, many of the oldest posts on the blog continue to gain traffic and, as a result, tend to rank highest in terms of overall traffic. Something to think about as you optimize and enhance your site in 2014.

Without further ado, I offer you The Most Popular Thinks Posts (2008-2012). Enjoy!

Well, Big Thinkers, I hope you enjoyed this look back as much as I did. But don’t worry. I’m not getting all nostalgic on you. Look forward to more great e-commerce and Internet marketing content tomorrow (and the next day. And the next. And the next…)

If you’re interested in learning more about the future of e-commerce and marketing via the social, local, mobile web, register to receive a special report I’ve produced in conjunction with hotel marketing firm Vizergy, “Digital Hotel Marketing in a Multiscreen World.” While it’s targeted specifically at hotel and resort marketers, the lessons apply to just about any business. You can get your free copy of the report here.

You might also enjoy some of our past coverage of the social, local, mobile web and what it means for your business, including:

Here’s a little history. I originally launched Thinks over on Google’s Blogger service, way back in December, 2004 (you can still view the retired old blog here). Back then, I focused less on marketing and business, to avoid any conflicts with my employer. Instead, I posted slightly snarky observations about Web culture, technology, and really anything that caught my interest.

In June, 2006, I launched a second blog, called “TravelStuff,” on WordPress.com to catalog developments in the world of online travel distribution and e-commerce (I worked for a hotel company at the time). Much like the original Thinks, I avoided too much direct commentary about the industry to avoid any conflicts of interest. That content evolved into my current “Travel Tuesday” series. Both the original TravelStuff items and new weekly “Travel Tuesday” posts are now hosted within Thinks but you can still view all travel-related content separately via the TravelStuff.TimPeter.com domain.

And, there you have it. The complete history of Tim Peter Thinks in a nutshell. Hope you enjoyed it. And I hope you keep coming back for more in 2014 and beyond.

But in prep for announcing this year’s Blogging All-Star Lineup (you can see last year’s list here), I thought I’d give you three reasons why blogging still makes sense for your business:

Your customers have questions that need answering. Customers, regardless of what they’re looking for, continue to begin their journey with search. And those that ask their friends (either IRL folks, or those they know only through social networks), typically rely on well-informed individuals. Guess where those well-informed folks get their information.

You have answers for those questions. I’m sure you do. You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t have to be world-class (though, it helps). What you do have to do is a.) know more than your customers do and, b.) don’t overstate what you do know. A big part of your brand story is based on what’s true about you. Your customers are smart. They’ll see through BS. Just tell the truth about where you’re able to help and the people who need that help will find you.

You want to rank well in search engines when people ask those questions. Not much to say about this one.

Blogging isn’t a panacea. It isn’t a silver bullet. It isn’t the Holy Grail. But in an era when many happily flit from technique to technique in hopes of finding a panacea/silver bullet/Holy Grail, it’s amazing how effective a well-structured blog that focuses on answering your customers’ needs works for many, many businesses.

Now, check back tomorrow when I announce this year’s Marketing and E-commerce Blogging All-Stars, the folks who share what they know to help your business grow.

Interested in learning more about e-commerce and digital marketing? Register to receive a free copy of my new special report, “Digital Hotel Marketing in a Multiscreen World,” produced in conjunction with Vizergy, here. While it’s targeted to the hospitality industry specifically, most of the lessons apply across verticals. And, if that’s not enough, you might also enjoy some of our past coverage of strategy, digital marketing, and e-commerce, including:

[*] – Of course exceptions exist. But, for many businesses, I think you should probably blog for your business. (I’m open to hearing about edge cases; let me know your reasons against in the comments).

Content marketing matters. I’ve said that time and again. But too often, we focus more on the “content” part and not enough on the “marketing” part.

Now, without content, you’ve got nothing to market, so a somewhat skewed ratio makes a certain sense. But at some point, you’ve got to promote your content — or even better, get others to promote it for you. My latest post for Mike Moran’s Biznology blog, “Share This: 5 Tips You Must Learn to Create Sharable Content” explores exactly how you can accomplish that latter task for your content.

And for your business.

Check it out.

Interested in more? Sign up for our free newsletter and get more information on how to build your social, local, mobile marketing strategy. And, if you’ve got a minute, you might enjoy some past coverage of content marketing, including:

Let’s be real. For a world so heavily dependent on communication, it’s amazing how frequently we fail to get our message across. Content marketing depends on clear communication, yet we often struggle to deliver our meaning and intent to our audience, right?

Happily, LeFever offers a wonderful guide to closing the communication gap all too common in business and in life. The book walks you through the steps necessary to improve your explanations, regardless of the form those explanations take (though, obviously, the material is particularly well-suited to presentations, video, email, and similar forms). LeFever’s day job at Common Craft revolves around taking complicated material and translating it for audiences of all kinds (their YouTube videos are legendary). The experience LeFever has gained over the years shows clearly throughout the book, which is filled with many examples from Common Craft’s library.

Interested in more? Sign up for our free newsletter and get more information on how to build your social, local, mobile marketing strategy. And, if you’ve got a minute, you might enjoy some past reviews from our Book Review of the Week-ish series:

Every year during the SuperBowl, I engage in a Twitter chat with a group of folks reviewing the ads as they happen (usually under the hashtag #BrandBowl or #AdBowl). And a couple of years ago, I noticed some best practices for ads that really connect with audiences. In 2013, not much has changed.

But, shortly after halftime, something amazing happened. The power went out at the SuperBowl. No, really. The lights went out (a trend I worry we’re going to see lots more of over time). The announcers couldn’t announce and the stadium went partly dark.

Yes, those of us on Twitter last night witnessed the birth of truly agile advertising. Buzzfeed has a great write-up of how it happened, but the net takeaway is that the brand and its agency were working together last night to monitor reaction to their SuperBowl ad and were well-positioned to take advantage of an opportunity.

By contrast, The Popcorn Factory sent me these two emails following last night’s game:

So, Oreo knew the lights were out during the game, created a pithy new message that showed the brand and its story in a favorable light (see what I did there?), while Popcorn Factory couldn’t figure out who won the game (it was the Baltimore Ravens, by the way).

Instead, compare Oreo’s tweet to Popcorn Factory’s email. One of these brands illustrated agile marketing brilliantly, responding in real time to its customers needs (in this case, something to do while waiting for the game to restart), while the other crafted one message regardless of outcome and then executed really poorly (and, I’m betting, pissed off their customers who are San Francisco 49ers fans to boot).

Seth Godin wrote today why the SuperBowl is such a big deal and why we’re unlikely to see anything like it in other sports in the future. I think he’s essentially right (though big events like the Oscars and the Grammys afford similar opportunities). But in an age of fragmented audiences, multiple screens, diverse interests, and countless marketing messages, those who do the best job of responding to their customers’ needs and concerns as they occur (real-time or near-to, anyway), will likely win the conversation. And the business.